Forgive Your Enemies

Hello, and welcome to the Salt Church Podcast. Thank you for tuning in to this week's message. Join us as we explore God's Word, providing practical teaching for day-to-day living. The message you are about to hear was recorded live at our Sunday morning worship experience. If you would like to learn more about Salt Church, please visit us at saltchurch.

org. We hope that you are encouraged by today's message. A great thing. So, we're entering into this new series called How to Live Through a Bad Day. How to Live Through a Bad Day.

We all have bad days, right? Everybody has bad days, and some worse than others, and some longer than others. In fact, some of our days bleed over into weeks, and for some of us, it seems like months and years on occasion. And those seasons are very hard. They're very difficult seasons.

And, you know, Jesus had those days as well. In fact, He witnessed the worst day, the worst day of all. And that was on the cross. And what we can learn from Jesus is amazing. And that's what we're doing today.

We're starting this series. We're launching this series, How to Live Through a Bad Day, so that we can focus on some of the last words of Jesus, what He taught us. And it's amazing. Even on the cross, as He was witnessing His last day, right before He went to the Father, as He He was passing away, He was actually teaching us. And I love how Hebrews 12, probably one of my favorite scriptures in the Bible, I would say it is my top five scriptures.

And I've taught on this on occasion. I probably preach on it at least once a year, because I just believe it's just so powerful. And that's in Hebrews 12. It says, let us run with perseverance, the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus. Why do we fix our eyes on Jesus?

Because He has something to tell us. He has something to show us. He is the pioneer and perfecter of faith. He knows faith because He began with faith. He started faith.

He created faith, right? He is faith. He is. There's a person in faith when we talk about faith. And I love how the message says it.

It says, keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished the race we're in. So He actually began the race, and He finished the race in. And study how He did it. How did He do it? Because what we know about Jesus is that it wasn't an easy road for Him.

Three years in His ministry were very hard years. They were the last years leading up to His death. And there were a lot of people that were against Him. He had a lot of very bad days. There weren't a lot of people for Him.

He had all these followers one day, and then the next day people would be running away from Him and leaving Him, right? And so we can learn from Him how to live through a bad day. So today I want to talk about the first statement that He made on the cross. And each week we'll introduce a new statement He made on the cross, some of the last statements He made. And the first statement He made in the cross was this, in Luke 23, 34.

It says, Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing. Father, forgive them because they have no clue what they're doing. One of the last statements He made. And like Jesus, this should be our first response to any situation. Our first response should always be to forgive.

Forgive them, for they don't know what they're doing. So the big idea for this message is this. Forgive everyone. If you're following your notes, you can write this down. Forgive everyone that's trying to ruin your life.

Forgive everyone that's trying to ruin your life. Because, you know, people, it just seems like for some people, that's their mission in life is to ruin you. Do you ever have those people in your life that it seems like every time you finally get away from them, they're back again. They show up again. I think about the movie, What About Bob?

Have you, how many of you watched that movie? It's kind of an older movie, but man, that was one of my favorite movies. And it's Richard Dreyfuss and Bill Murray. And Bill Murray is Bob. And Bob's this kind of basket case that Richard Dreyfuss, the other character, he's like the therapist.

And, you know, he's his patient. And so Richard Dreyfuss's character tries to go on vacation. And then Bob shows up somehow, somewhere, some way, right down the road from him. And he's trying to get away from Bob. And then his family ends up inviting him in his house.

And then he runs. And it comes to a point where he's actually tying Bob up to a bomb or something like that out in the woods. And hoping he would blow up, you know, like it was that bad. I want this guy out of my way. He is driving me crazy.

He is ruining my life, right? And as he's leaving, he's like, ha, ha, ha, he's gone crazy, you know. And he's thinking, ah, Bob will never come back. And then his car breaks down, and here comes Bob in the back of a pickup truck. Oh, see you later.

See you back at the house. Have him home at, you know, 2 o'clock or whatever for dinner. It seems like there are people like that in our lives. They're just there to ruin their life. It's like they took the spiritual gifts assessment that we offer here at the church.

And their gift is, I want to ruin your life, okay? I want to ruin people's lives. And it just seems that way. And offense does come. We deal with people like that all the time, right?

And it's going to happen. In fact, it's inevitable that you will deal with offense, right? Offense is going to happen. In fact, if you look, Jesus talks about this. There's a scripture for that, Luke 17, 1.

Then he said to his disciples, it is impossible that one, it is impossible that no one, no offenses should come. It is impossible that no offenses should come. That means it's just going to happen. Somebody's going to come across our lives at some point in our lives. And even if we are believers and we're walking with the Lord and we're doing all the right things, there's still going to be people in our lives that want to make us just do the wrong thing, right, to them.

I mean, we want to strangle them. We want to hurt them at some point, you know, in our hearts. And so offense does come. So what happens when offense comes? And what happens if offense isn't dealt with?

Let's just go there first. What happens when offense isn't dealt with? Well, Proverbs says this, an offended brother is more unyelding than a fortified city. And disputes are like barred gates in a citadel. So if we don't deal with offense, we become locked up.

We shut off. We are stubborn. We are hard-headed. It makes us the worst case of us when we hold on to offense. I love how Hebrews 12, 15 talks about bitterness, how we have bitterness.

When we have bitterness inside of us, it grows and it sprouts into something that we don't want it to be. It says, see to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. So when bitterness grows, when we don't deal with unforgiveness, when we have offense that comes in our life and we don't deal with it, it spreads like an infection and it causes trouble. It defiles other people. It's like an infection that takes place and you can't kill the infection unless forgiveness steps into the equation.

So if we don't deal with unforgiveness, it can be, we can shut off and it can spread like an infection. So let me just start off with showing you five things that Jesus dealt with that I believe we all can relate to because a lot of people are like, you just don't understand, Pastor, what I'm going through. You know, I may not understand all that you're dealing with and all the things that you have issues with during the week and during the months and maybe I don't understand your family history and how all that affects your life. I know some of you have things in your life that I probably can't relate to, but can I tell you, you have a God who can relate to that. And there's five things that he experienced within a 12-hour period on the cross.

The first thing is he experienced betrayal. If you'll write that down, betrayal. He experienced the betrayal of a dear friend. And nothing hurts worse than being betrayed by somebody you deeply care about, you deeply love. We look at Judas.

I imagine when he saw Judas for just 30 pieces of silver trade his life. Judas was one of his 12. Judas was his bag carrier. He was the one that handled the finances. I'm sure Judas at one time was a very trustworthy person in his circle of 12.

And here we see betrayal take place. And I can imagine the heart. He knew the heart of Jesus. He heard his stories. He watched him as he ministered to people.

He did all these things. And Judas knew who he was. But yet, Judas betrayed him. And the heart of what that can do. And I can imagine that there are people in here who have experienced betrayal.

Maybe a dear friend betrayed you at some point. Maybe a business partner that you really believed in betrayed you. It's hard, especially when it's someone that you deeply love and are deeply close to. And then they take Jesus. After Judas betrays him, they take Jesus and they illegally put him on trial.

So Jesus is illegally put on trial and they begin to attack him with false accusations. That's point two, false accusations. Jesus was misrepresented. False accusation. I can tell you this probably bothers me.

I probably hate this more than anything. When somebody falsely accuses me of something, something I didn't do or doesn't represent me well, that's probably the hardest thing for me to give. Anything that makes, if anything makes me angry, that's what makes me angry. When somebody messes up my character or talks something that isn't true about me. And I'm sure that's the same for you.

And the best way to handle it is to forgive. But and I've got a few on my list right now that I've written down and I'm praying and I'm forgiving and I'm praying. It's hard. It's hard. And to experience that, we have to actively and regularly forgive in those situations.

The third thing that Jesus dealt with was rejection. Rejection. Not only was he rejected by the very crowd that was praising him into the city when he was riding on the donkey on what we call Palm Sunday, where we celebrate that moment where he was coming into to the town, fulfilling the prophecy of scripture. And everybody was celebrating, it's the Savior, it's the King, it's Lord, it's the Christ, it's him, you know. And they're waving palm branches.

That very, very same crowd would be completely against him. And not only would they reject him, even his closest friends would reject him as he was on trial. Nobody came. Nobody came to his side. They left him.

They abandoned him. Peter, James, John, nowhere to be seen. He was rejected. And it's always hard to be rejected. I think about, you know, even as early as elementary school, junior high, high school, I think people could probably relate.

A lot of us can go back to those days. You know how you had that best friend, possibly. And as you grow up, you kind of fall apart or separate or whatever. But it always seems to happen around those periods of time. It's like our first thought of rejection, where you have your best friend, and then your best friend maybe finds a new group of friends.

And then they start ignoring you or rejecting you or not being with you anymore, not hanging out with you anymore. And then you're like, what's going on? There's nothing worse than rejection. And this doesn't just happen for young people. It happens for all of us.

You know, there's times where you just feel rejected. You feel not only betrayed, but you feel like they're just not, they found somebody else, and we're no longer important. And we're no longer, they're no longer there for us. And there's nothing more lonelier than rejection. And let me just say this, in the age of social media, it's really tough.

In fact, I read a statistic the other day that the suicide rate has risen as a result of interaction on social media, because we even sense rejection on those ends. When we talk and we see and people are commenting and people are talking about others and rejecting others and falsely accusing others. And we define our lives on that structure. It's sad to see that people are actually listening to these people on social media, talking about them, and defining themselves based on what somebody else thinks. Let me tell you, get off of Facebook, come to church and find out who you really are.

Get away from that. They do not define you. When Christ defines you, rejection hurts. And we need to learn how to forgive those and learn who we are in Christ. I remember my father sharing a story with me when he was younger.

He's a pastor. He's been a pastor for years and has a lot of experience. And I remember having a really tough time about six or seven years ago. And I experienced some of the stuff, false accusations and rejection and things like that. Being a pastor, it just kind of comes with the territory.

We expect that when we're called the minister. There's going to be people that don't like us, okay? Because we're preaching the gospel and we're preaching the truth at times. And some people are offended. They find offense.

And we just know that that's going to happen. And I was really struggling with that. And he said, he said, let me share a story with you. He says, when I was younger, he says, this is why I don't define myself by what other people think about me. When I was younger, a young pastor, I was in this church.

And back then, churches, you kind of moved every few years, like every two to four years of these churches, they would kind of send you to different places. It wasn't like a pastor came and stayed to the church his entire life and was the visionary of the church. It was board ran. So a lot of boards ran those churches and decided who was going to pastor their churches even. So you had to actually go in and interview with the board to even receive the job, right?

And obviously, he had vision for the church. He wanted to do all these amazing things. But he lasted about a little over a year at that church. And the board called him in and just said, we just don't think we can keep you anymore. He's like, why not?

And he says, one of the guys leaned over at the table, one of the board members and looked him straight in the eye and said, I don't think you're called to be a pastor. He was like, I don't know what else I'm called to be because I know in my heart that I'm called to be a pastor. What else could I do? That's my calling. That's who I am in Christ.

That's what, you know, and it really just took him down, you know. It hurt him really bad. Well, he moved on, obviously, and God just encouraged him during that time. He went to another church and really prospered in that ministry and went on to do, even today, just his ministry is amazing. He does amazing.

I'm not saying that just because he's my father, but there's been lots of people been saved under his ministry. He's had churches flourish and grow under his ministry. Just some amazing things have happened, and he was at a conference, I think, back about six, seven years ago, and this same man came to him one day, and he leaned over, and he says, Pastor Dwight, his first name's Dwight, Pastor Dwight, Pastor Dunning, whatever. Pastor Dwight, let me just shake your hand. He says, you know what?

You were the best pastor we ever had at our church, and he says, I do not let people define me. I don't let boards define me. I don't let anybody define who I am in Christ and what I'm called to be. Let that be a lesson to you. Nobody.

Rejection. Rejection. Forgive them, because God's got something more for you. Amen? The next one is abuse.

Abuse, and I can't even imagine what some of the abuse you have been through. Maybe this was physical abuse, or maybe it's mental abuse, but we know that Jesus had. Horrible physical abuse. In fact, mentally he was abused and obviously spiritually when the father turned his back on him during those moments. They sped on him, they threw things at him, they ridiculed him, they whipped him, they hurt him, they beat him, they called him names, they did everything to get emotionally mocked him.

And Isaiah even said it was to the point of not even recognizing him he was beat so bad. You know, we looked at Passion of the Christ and we're like, I don't know if any of you have seen that movie, or I remember when it came out at field movie theaters, and after I saw that movie, everybody walking out was super quiet, right? Because we were like, wow, you know? But not even that does justice to what was really happening to Jesus that day. To the point of not even recognizing him as a body.

He was beat, he was abused. Physically, verbally, hatred, just pure evil and hatred were poured out on him. And he hung on a cross naked. The fifth thing, humiliation. He was naked on a cross, there to hang before everyone.

Not only physical pain, but humiliation. Nobody wants to be humiliated. Nobody wants to be ridiculed. Nobody wants to be rejected. Nobody.

But we all experience these things. We got these things in our life, these people in our life, these events in our lives, that it's just inevitable that somebody's going to say or do or have a thought, a negative thought against us. So, he went through all of this. Why would he go through all of this? I remember being with a young, when I was a youth pastor, a young 13-year-old.

He was sitting beside me and we were watching that movie and he was just crying and bawling. And he looked over at me and he said, why would he do this? Why would he even do this? And why would he do this for me? He went through it all just so he could relate to you.

It was to relate to you. So, anything you experience in this life is not too far removed from God. He's experienced it. Jesus has experienced it. And guess what?

He's interceding by the Father right now at this moment for you. He's asking the Father. He's petitioning the Father. He says, I know what she's going through. I know the abuse that she's facing.

I know the rejection that he's facing. I know the false accusations that are thrown against. I know what that's like, Daddy. Will you, will you, will you touch them? Will you be there for them?

I'm asking you to intercede, Lord, in this account. My Father, Abba, Daddy. And he's doing that. In fact, Hebrews 2, 17, 18 says this. I love how the message says this.

That's why he had to enter into every detail of human life. He entered into every avenue, every possibility. On the cross, before the cross, leading up to the cross. He felt the pain. He felt the shame.

Every hurt, every heartache that you felt, he can relate to. He had to enter into every detail of human life. Then, when he came before God as high priest, which is how he sits as high priest, petitioning the Father on the throne to get rid of the people's sins, he would have already experienced it all for himself. All the pain, all the testing, and would be able to help where help was needed. He's here to help you.

He's here for you. He understands. And nothing in you is going to want to forgive when you experience stuff like that. But we see a God who experienced it, and he chose to forgive. Because it's going to be an act of your mind.

An act of your mind to forgive the people who offend you before it is an act of your emotions. It's got to be an act of your mind before it's an act of your emotions because what happens to your emotions always do the wrong thing. They always send you the wrong way. You cannot trust your emotions. You have to first be active in your thinking.

In 1 Peter 4-1 says this, Since Christ suffered while he was in his body, strengthen yourselves with the same way of what? Of thinking Christ had. We need to have that same way of thinking as we're going through this series, How to Live Through a Bad Day. What we're trying to do is change our thought process so that we can think better. So that we can think about how our day is going the way that Jesus thought about it.

And how he was able to overcome the worst day of all by the right thinking so we can learn to think like him. Now let me give you four things. I know I've got a lot of things today, but there's just so much. What forgiveness is not. And this isn't in your notes, but just write this down or put it on the back of your notes there.

It says, so here's what forgiveness is not because a lot of people get forgiveness mixed up with a few things. First of all, it's not minimizing the seriousness of the offense. Okay? Forgiveness is not minimizing the seriousness of an offense. If it's an offense against you, we realize that it's a terrible thing.

But it's not minimizing those things. We know that it's hard. We know that it hurts. We know that what they did was wrong. So we're not saying, oh, they're okay.

It's okay because they did that. We're not saying that. It's okay that they left me out of that. It's okay that they're talking bad against me and slandering my name and slandering my good word. It's not okay.

It's not okay on their end. So it's not minimizing the seriousness of the offense. It's not reconciliation neither. Reconciliation. Because reconciliation is a two-way street.

Two people have to come into that situation and be willing to forgive each other for it to be reconciliation. But forgiveness is a one-player game. And we can always choose to forgive even if that other person never changes. It's not about what's fair, the third point. It's not about what's fair.

If it's about fair, then we need to go pay for our own sins. Amen? It's not about what's fair. In fact, I love what C.S.

Lewis said about this. He said, to be a Christian, we forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in me. I'm inexcusable. I'm sinful. I've done a lot of things wrong.

So it's not about fair. I know there's a lot of cases where you're going to look at that other person. You're going to say, well, it's not fair. I don't think I should forgive them. I don't think, look what they've done.

It really isn't about fair. It really isn't about fair. And then the fourth, it's not impossible to forgive. And I know for some of you in here today, it's really hard. It's hard to forgive.

Somebody's done something to you. Somebody said something about you. Somebody's physically hurt you in some way. God forbid some of those things go way deep. But it's not impossible to forgive.

And as Jesus was on the cross, he chose to forgive. He showed us that even in that moment where he was being beaten, ridiculed, and hung, and humiliated on a cross, he looked down. First thing, the first approach he made was, forgive them, Lord, for they don't know what they're doing. They don't know what they're doing. Ephesians 3, 20 says, Now to him who is able, and I love this, him is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine according to his power that is at work within us.

So where do we get the power? Him, from him who is immeasurably able to give us everything we need to do the impossible. As he's working within us. He gives us strength. So there's three things I want to quickly share with you.

And then we'll close. The first thing is, we need to pray for them. We need to pray for our enemies. Amen. I'll pray for them, all right.

I'll ask God to break the teeth of the wicked, because that's in the Bible, you know. I'm going to use that scripture. Smite them, Lord, you know. That's in the Bible. I can use that, Lord.

But Jesus took things to another level. We could look through the Old Testament and we see, you know, hate your enemies and love your neighbors, but he tells them something different. And I love how Jesus always elevated things to another level. He always took something and made it almost impossible and then took it back down to the heart. He always elevated things.

And he said this, you have heard that it was said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. You know, yeah, that's what the Bible says. Smite my enemy, Lord. I've been there. Avenge me, Lord.

Avenge me, you know. I'm like crying out Davidic Psalms, you know, sometimes. Like, avenge me, Lord. But here's what he says. He says, but I tell you, love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you.

Pray for them. You know, their life may not be changed. They may continue to do the same things to you and to other people. They may not be changed, but you will if you pray for them. It's hard to hate somebody when you pray for them.

And when you begin to pray for them, you think differently about them. They don't win. You win when you begin to pray for people. We need to pray for them. Number two, we need to bless them.

We need to bless them. What does bless them mean? It means to speak well of them. It's going to be really hard. It's really hard.

I'll just say that. It's not just going to be. It is. It is really hard to bless and talk well about somebody who's done you wrong. It's very, very, very difficult.

And I know this is where the root of gossip is, you know. And because you start talking about that person and the way they are and what they've done to you, then others get that and it's like, you know, the phone line game, you know, where it gets down the line. And then all of a sudden, you've done exactly what they've done. You falsely accused them. You've done some humiliating for them.

Now, here's what you do. You bless them. You speak well of them. You talk about the good things about them. You cut that off right away when they begin to talk about, when that anger comes in you, you want to say something about that person.

You need to speak well of them. I'm going to bless them. I'm going to speak well of them. Look what Luke 6 says in verse 27, 28. But I tell you who hear me, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and bless those who curse you.

Pray for those who mistreat you. Don't curse them. Don't talk bad about them. Don't be hateful to them. Bless them.

You'll win every time if you bless them. I had a mentor, a pastor mentor, a great pastor, and he shared a story with me. He had all this grumpy guy that always gave him a hard time. You know, he was always grumbling about the church, the church service, the songs, the meetings. I mean, everything was just bad with this guy.

He always had a sour face. You know, he said he was bald and had a sour face. He'd just walk around all day long, just sour, just sourpuss all over the place, you know. And he came up one Sunday morning, and he walks up to the pastor, and he said, I knew he was just getting ready to talk about the service or talk about me or talk about something else and do his normal sourpuss thing. He said, I just grabbed him, and I embraced him.

I gave him a big old bear hug, and I kissed him right on the forehead. Mwah! He just did that. He said, the guy just looked back at him, stepped back, and he began to smile and laugh. See, we can overcome those things by speaking well of people and loving them, regardless of how we feel about them.

Number three, we do good to them. We do good to them. We not only pray for them and speak well of them, but we do good to them. Buy your evil boss a gift. How about that?

That will really go great, right? Go in and just show up some Krispy Kreme donuts, hot, fresh. Lay them on his or her desk, even though they've been treating you bad that week. Some of you have good bosses. I get that.

But I know that many of you are like, oh, man, I don't even want to go to work in the morning. Or that co-worker that really just drives you crazy that's always turning you in, and you're always getting written up, you know. Or maybe that next-door neighbor that just won't stop complaining about what's in your backyard, or you're a half foot in their backyard, or whatever it might be. They're always walking. They're always looking out the window.

They're always reporting the church trailer in your driveway. That's not personal. I'm going to move it, for crying out loud. Just give me a day or two. Okay?

Do good to people. Send your worst enemy a card. Like, that person that you really are having a hard time with, why don't you send them a card and speak well of them in that card and just send it to them. I promise you, it will do some stuff. Speak well of them.

Do good to them. Romans 12, 17 through 21 says, Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Can you do that?

Live at peace with everyone, even your enemies. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath. In fact, let God handle it. You say, avenge me, God. God's like, I've already got that part of it.

I just need you to practice peace. And I need you to practice love. So, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written, it is mine to avenge. I will repay, says the Lord. On the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed them.

If he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head. So do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Some of you are like, well, I want to heap some burning coals on his head. But in context, that's not what that means.

It was actually a good thing to have long burning coals. And it was a high commodity in that day to have coals that you could heat food with and keep an oven going with. And it cost good money. So what you're doing is you're blessing. And this is just the Leon interpretation here.

I think about why would he say heap burning coals on the head? Because it begins to change their thinking process. Their thinking process begins to change. By way of their thinking process, your thinking process and your heart, their thinking process, they begin to change. There's a story just in closing.

Many of you probably know Joyce Meyer. She's a televangelist, popular women's minister. She's a psychologist, and she talks a lot about offense and unforgiveness. And she was at a conference one time, and she shared something. She says, I'm going to share something that I've never shared with anybody before.

And she said this. She said, she was raped over 200 times. She knew the exact number of the amount of times she was raped by her father from a very young age. And she said, I remember every vivid detail. And you could just see the tears in her eyes as she was talking about this.

I knew every detail. I could not get nervous. Over 200 times. And when confronted with this. The principle of forgiveness for my father, I chose to play into this.

I chose to activate this very principle in my life. She said, my father never apologized to me. He never kept up with me in my ministry, she said. He never said he was proud of me. There was no reason for her to forgive him, but she said she went to her parents and reconnected with them after years.

She paid all their bills, she brought them out of debt, and she set them up for the rest of their lives. Guys, a father who raped her over 200 times, set him up for the rest of his life. She built them a brand new house beside hers because the Holy Spirit led her to do it. The Holy Spirit told her, you have to do this. You need to do this.

Well, I don't want to, Holy Spirit. Well, you've got to. And she followed what God was telling her. And then the Holy Spirit began, see, when we do things, the Holy Spirit begins to work in our situation. When we are obedient, even when it seems impossible, when it seems like the wrong direction to go, he begins to work.

And she said the Holy Spirit began to work in that situation, and her father came to her one day, sobbing, crying, asking her for forgiveness on his knees, asking her for forgiveness for all those things he had done. And at that moment, at that moment, they reconciled. She led him to the Lord that day, and just a few weeks later, she baptized him. She baptized her abusive father in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Man, it's not impossible. And not long after that, he passed away, and today he's in heaven with the Lord. And this is the craziest part of it all, guys. She said, I don't regret what I went through, because it gave me a chance to experience the suffering of Christ, that Christ went through. And I have that power working inside of me, and I would gladly go through it again.

I relate to Jesus Christ, willing and able to say that. Last point, the forgiven forgives. The forgiven forgive, because we have been forgiven. We have the power to forgive. Amen.

Because we have been rescued from all the shame and all the—we cursed God. We left him. We were far from him, whether small or big. We were separated from God. And what did he do?

He went up on the cross, and he made those last words, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing. Will you forgive today? If you're struggling with unforgiveness, imagine how much difference your life could be if you held no offense, how stronger, how more powerful your testimony can be, how much freer you can be if you choose to not allow offense to enter your life. Amen.

It's powerful. God's last words, Jesus' last words are powerful. They're life-changing, they're cultural-changing, they're everything, atmosphere-changing, just by what we say and how we have. Matthew 10, 8, freely you have received, freely, freely give. Freely you have received the grace of Jesus Christ.

Let's bow our heads just for a second, and I want us just to reflect in this moment for a second. Some of you here today, you need to forgive. You need to forgive. I'm not saying you can't forget. You can forget.

But I'm saying that you can forgive. I want you, if you're here today and you're struggling with some unforgiveness, whether it's a past or present issue, maybe it's current, maybe it's a long, long time ago, maybe even that person has left this world. Lord, I want you to pray this, Lord, I know it's not easy, but it's possible through you. Today I choose, not because of my emotions, not because of my feelings, not because of my thoughts, but because you say to forgive. So today I actively make the choice to forgive.

I forgive him. I forgive her. I forgive them. We forgive them. We are walking out of this place today forgiving and forgiven.

Amen. We are believing that today. And in that same spirit of prayer, there are some of you that may have never experienced the forgiveness of Jesus today, right now, in this place. And maybe you've been tugged through this entire service, and you're like, wow, why is this happening? That's called the Holy Spirit calling you and saying, I love you.

God loves you, and he wants a relationship with you. And I know you've done a lot of things. I know you've turned your back on me. I know you've done evil things in your life, but you're not to the point of being forgiven. If that's you today, I'm not going to embarrass you.

I just ask you just to gently lift your hand. I want to just pray for you. I want to surrender myself to God, to ask him to forgive me. If you would pray this with me, Father, in the name of Jesus, I believe that you are the Son of God, that you died on the cross for my sin. Lord, forgive me so that I can in turn forgive others.

Come into my heart. Come into my life. Make me new. Change me from the inside. If you would all just stand with me for a minute.

If somebody could hand me a cup off of one of those seats. As we enter into this season, I just wanted to take a moment to participate, that all of us can participate together in communion. And we're going to do this again on Good Friday as well. Just as we go through this season, we're going to reflect on the goodness of Jesus on the cross. Forgiveness.

This right here is forgiveness. This is a symbol of everything he did on the cross. And he said, and Paul even said, as often as you do this, remember, remember the blood that was shed and the body that was broken. And it says in the gospel message, and as they were reclining up in the room, it was... So...

So... So you can live... So you can live... It was before Jesus was betrayed, before Jesus would go to the cross, I know these things are very difficult to open, I'm sitting here trying to be eloquent, if you would do this for me, yeah thank you, but taking this moment very seriously, as they were sitting around and it was often normal in the Passover season to be around the table and to fellowship together and to eat and break bread together and talk about and remember the things that happened in the ancient Israelites and what God had done, but he said I bring a new covenant to you and he began to share that bread, he passed it around the table and he took the bread and he says this is my body which is broken for you. This is going to represent the past, all the sins of the past, it's going to represent the present, everything that's getting ready to happen is going to be a pivotal point from this day forward, as soon as you believe and trust in me, this is what that will represent.

And this represents the future, a kingdom that I will establish one day, a new kingdom. So take this bread and eat it and do this in remembrance of the body that was broken for you. And then it says in the same manner he took the cup, a cup full of wine, which was the normal custom. They would always drink of that cup as they remembered the Passover. And again he took that new covenant and he says this is the body of that new covenant, I mean the bread, the blood of that new covenant, which I'm getting ready to shed for you.

And I want you to do this as often as you can in remembrance of me. Let's remember the Lord today as we drink of his blood and remember, Lord we are so thankful. We are so thankful for the body and the blood that was broken and shed that day. What more could we do but to give our lives and give our hearts? So we thank you God and we celebrate.

Church, can you just celebrate one good time this morning? Come on, give God a grand clap.